Scavenger Hunt
by Stratagem Blue
Summary: DH spoilers. As Voldemort's hand extends ever further, Harry finds the most unlikely allies in the most hated of Death Eaters, and the bloody history of the Elder Wand is brought to new and horrific heights as the trio are pushed to desperate measures...
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. There are Deathly Hallows Spoilers in this - you have been warned.

A/N: I thoroughly enjoyed Deathly Hallows, and carry nothing against it, yet I found myself craving more insight, more closure, and ultimately wanting a broader scope. (The epilogue just didn't do it for me). I guess this would be considered AU, as in this set of events the Elder Wand takes on a much more cynical role; some characters are explored to deeper levels, redemption is found for others, and certain creatures take on a more definable part in the final stages of the story. Also, both Wormtail and Grindelwald are still alive, for reasons that will come up later. For anyone who wanted just plain _more_, here it is. This takes off a few days after the escape at Malfoy Manor. Enjoy.

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Chapter 1: The Passions of Wizards

He gazed out across the water, watching the foamy crests of the sea waves as they crashed against the rocks just below his perch on the cliff. He barely registered the sound of the water lapping the shore or the smell of the salty air, his mind buzzing over so many puzzles and decisions from the past few days. Shell Cottage hovered in his peripheral vision, quaint and lovely, but far too crowded to find a place in which to sit and think. He needed quiet; he needed to think.

Daybreak had come and gone hours ago, but still the sky remained bleak and gray above him. His head felt weighed down by the images that lingered inside, and he thought he now understood the true advantage of the Pensieve. Yet he felt strangely hollowed out in terms of emotion, almost as though he were drifting from one vague feeling to the next.

Harry tried to relax, to ponder lightly over his situation and the tasks ahead, but flashes of Malfoy Manor kept intruding whenever he concentrated too much. He could see the chandelier falling, the sword of Godric Gryffindor clutched tightly in Bellatrix's hands, the pale face of Draco Malfoy. It was perhaps that last which stayed with Harry; their animosity towards each other had always been more than just a childish spat, but seeing him so utterly consumed by dark heritage and terrible decisions, unable to escape his fate, was simply pitiful.

And Dobby. All compassion for his arch nemesis died away at the thought of the little elf, and with a touch of foreboding, Harry moved ever so slightly to look over his shoulder into the garden, and saw the tiny white headstone resting atop the freshly turned earth. All the thoughts and theories that had visited him as he had dug the small grave leapt back to mind, and the choice that had been haunting him for days.

The Deathly Hallows. The Elder Wand. Voldemort was now in possession of what some believed to be the most powerful of the three, and he, Harry, had made no effort to prevent it. He had let him slip onto the Hogwarts grounds, let him disturb the tomb of its greatest headmaster, and had watched inside his own head as those pale, skeletal hands removed the wand of Albus Dumbledore...

He had chosen Horcruxes over Hallows; had chosen, in a way, Dumbledore over himself. But had that been the right decision?

Yet what bothered him more than anything, what burned like a fever in his conscience, was the _concept _of the Elder Wand. An unbeatable wand, the Deathstick, the Wand of Destiny. He had no doubt of its existence, or that the wand Voldemort now carried was the actual Hallow in question. It was its right of passage, its descent from one wizard to another, that struck an ominous feeling in Harry.

_Whether it _needs _to pass by murder, I do not know. Its history is bloody, but that may be simply due to the fact that it is such a desirable object, and arouses such passions in wizards. Immensely powerful, dangerous in the wrong hands, and an object of incredible fascination to all of us who study the power of wands._

The words of the old wandmaker would not leave his head. They floated through his thoughts, taunting him with some deeper meaning. A gust of wind swept over his forehead, blowing back his hair and momentarily revealing the lightning shaped scar beneath. He rubbed it absentmindedly, for once the vague prickling sensation of his connection with Voldemort having subsided.

He sighed and wrapped his hands around his knees. What was he looking for? What was he missing?

_'The bloody trail of the Elder Wand is splattered across the pages of Wizarding history' ... Gregorovitch ... Gregorovitch had the Elder Wand ... and then Grindelwald stole it ...and of course, if Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald, he would have taken the wand, won its allegiance ... Voldemort never even had to visit Nurmengard ... after finding that picture in Godric's Hollow, it was only a matter of research and deduction ..._

"Harry?"

He glanced up and saw Ron standing over him, a look of slight apprehension on his face.

"What were you saying?"

With a rush of discomfort, Harry realized he must have been mumbling out loud as he sat there, all by himself. He said something about thinking aloud and turned his eyes back to the ocean, hoping Ron would retreat back to the house. Instead, he planted himself on a nearby stump and they passed a few uneasy moments in silence together.

Harry was very aware of Ron watching him, concerned and troubled by his friend's odd behavior. It was rather annoying, as Ron's presence interrupted the flow of his thoughts as surely as the noise of the overfilled little cottage, and Harry felt as though the stare were burning into him. Accusing him. He knew Ron still believed he had made a critical error in not trying to obtain the wand before Voldemort, but his own indecision was already eating away at him - he didn't need Ron's as well.

"I know what you're thinking," he said at length.

"If you're going to say something about the Elder Wand, then you're right," Ron replied, seemingly relieved that he had not been required to break the silence. "But I wasn't thinking of how...what I mean to say is...I reckon you made the right decision."

Harry looked at him. "Why? All you've been saying for the past few days is how I gave You-Know-Who a new weapon."

Ron shrugged. "Yeah, but I've been thinking, if Dumbledore gave Hermione that clue in the fairy tale book, and he was looking at your cloak the night your parents... well, he obviously knew about the Hallows, but he specifically told you to look for Horcruxes. There must be a reason for that."

"That's what I...thanks," Harry said, smiling for the first time in days. It was nice to have Ron back on his side, and to get a little reassurance.

"Still, You-Know-Who's up by one Hallow and we still have Horcruxes to find," Ron added.

"True," Harry replied, turning on his rock to face him. "But I'm pretty sure that, if our plans for Gringotts go right, we might be one up as well."

"Yeah. Just wish we didn't have to work with that little git," he hissed, and Harry knew he was referring to Griphook. An uneasy look came over Ron's face, and he gave the cottage a quick glance before continuing in a low voice. "He doesn't trust us at all, and I'll bet he has as much a plan to backstab us as _we _do at reneging on our promise for the sword. We'll have to keep a close eye on him."

"I know. From what Bill's been telling me, they're quite attached to the things they make, and couldn't care less about the wizard or the money that bought them. I wouldn't mind handing over the sword, but I refuse to let go of it until we've destroyed every single Horcrux. Griphook will just have to deal with it."

He sighed again, fingering the Mokeskin bag lightly as he stared into the distance beyond Shell Cottage. His thoughts abruptly turned to Ginny, and he felt a mixture of warmth and depression as he envisioned her face clearly in his mind. He remembered that long ago evening shared in her bedroom, and those few stolen kisses that had somehow made his birthday so much more blissful, and poignant. If he concentrated, he could still feel the slight pressure of her lips on his...

He suddenly could feel Ron watching him again, and had the insane notion that he knew exactly what Harry had been thinking. Yet when he risked a glance, he saw that Ron was only waiting for him to speak again. He restrained another sigh.

"I think we should try for it tomorrow," Harry said.

"_What_? Seriously? Are...are you sure? I mean-" He paused for a moment, apparently hoping that appropriate words would come to him. When they didn't, he said, "Do you think we have the plan down enough? We don't want to chance anything-"

"That's basically all it's going to be; chance. Chance, and luck," Harry said flatly, and Ron nodded, though he looked extremely unenthusiastic about it.

"Luck. I wish we had some Felix Felicis right now," Ron mumbled.

"You're not the only one," he replied. As he looked out across the ocean again, a pang of hunger went through him. Perhaps the greatest part of staying with Bill and Fleur was the food; no longer having to steal it, or dig it out of some ugly, foul tasting bush. "I guess we should head back for lunch."

"Yep. Besides, we best tell Hermione as soon as we can, if we're heading out tomorrow," Ron said, and they both got to their feet. Harry stretched, his muscles stiff from sitting so long. They began walking up through the garden. "She's the one with the biggest part to play, after all."

The day had grown warmer from the cool morning he had ventured out into. Shafts of light had begun to appear as the sun rose higher in the sky, turning all the flowers into dazzling patches of color. The whole garden was neat and kempt, the hedges trimmed without any sign of a weed, but Harry remembered the little gnomes from the garden at the Burrow and felt a wave of deep nostalgia wash over him. It had truly been his only home when away from Hogwarts, and now it seemed that he had as much chance of seeing it again as the beloved castle, or Hagrid's hut, or the little town of Hogsmeade. Not wanting to dwell on what he could not change, Harry put such thoughts from his mind.

They climbed the steps onto the porch, making sure to wipe their feet on the doormat. (Fleur grew particularly incensed when dirty footprints appeared on her clean kitchen floor.) Ron's stomach gave a loud grumble, and he pulled a face of foreboding as he looked at the door.

"Hope she's fixing something I know," he said, massaging his stomach. "She sometimes fancies those French dishes that taste a bit strange, like that bouillabaisse stuff we had a couple of days ago. Remember?"

"How could I forget," Harry said, and grabbed the door handle.

As his fingers closed around the cold metal of the knob, his scar seared with sudden pain. It was so intense that everything around him was immediately dulled; he was only dimly aware of Ron grasping his shoulder. He felt his knees hit the solid wood of the porch as he pressed both hands to his forehead, clutching at his burning scar, while a fury that was not his arose inside him. The sound of the sea and the fragrance of the flowers melted away, and he could no longer feel the warm rays of sunlight pouring over him...

_He was standing in a stone cell at the top of a high tower, littered pathetically with only a few bundles of straw and some frayed old blankets. A figure was wrapped inside those blankets, terribly frail and shivering slightly as he lay on the cold floor. The sound of waves reached them distantly from below, the smell of salt only tangible enough to drive those imprisoned mad with thoughts of the outside world. Harry took a step nearer to the huddled form, and it rolled over as the noise echoed in the tiny room._

_Harry had seen this face before; he had been in this place before. The sunken eyes stared up at him out of the ancient face, so wrinkled and lined that it appeared chiseled rather than aged. The teeth were rotted out and the rasping of labored breathing reached his ears, every rib and joint protruding out of the wasted frame. But the eyes were alive, shining like beacons out of that half dead face, and filled with an insatiable hunger._

_Harry twirled the Elder Wand lazily through his fingers._

_"I've returned, but I do not know what you hope to have gained by this," he said, towering over the feeble man. "The Elder Wand is now in my possession. I spared your life on the off chance that what you said is true, and that you have information that I would do well to acquire. Yet I have everything I need to secure what I want, for no other wand can surpass the one I carry. What more could you possibly know, if you insist that it was never yours?"_

_"If you didn't think I had something to give you," Grindelwald whispered, his face breaking into an unsightly grin, "then you wouldn't have come back. Obviously, you are not as assured of your precious new play toy as you try to appear."_

_"How dare you!" Harry hissed, the scarlet eyes flashing dangerously. "What brilliant insights do you think you hold, to speak to me in such a way? I've killed for less."_

_"Well, it seems we have at least one thing in common," he replied, gazing calmly up into the snakelike face above him. "And believe me, to achieve what you so desperately seek, a fair bit of killing will be required."_

_"And what is it that you think I seek?" _

_"Harry Potter," Grindelwald said promptly, and let out a bark of laughter at the surprise in the younger wizard's eyes. "Yes, even in these concrete walls, news of outside doings still reach me. But what you truly want, what you have traveled far and wide to achieve, is to gain absolute control over the wand that has been so adequately named 'The Deathstick.' "_

_"What makes you think I have not already mastered the power of this wand?" Harry asked, suspicion and doubt flooding his system._

_"Because I never did," Grindelwald said quietly._

_"You said you never had it!"_

_"No, indeed, I never did. I held it, I carried it, but it was never mine." Grindelwald spoke barely above a whisper, his voice dripping with bitterness. The horrible hunger in his eyes seemed momentarily to consume him, but it abated quickly. "No, you see, the Elder Wand has not had a true master in quite some time, as no one has killed for it in over a hundred years."_

_There was a pause, in which hours seemed to be contained in the passing of minutes. The ocean outside the single window was the only sound apart from the ragged breathing of the man on the floor and, somewhere in the depths of the fortress, the moaning of the condemned and forgotten._

_Then Harry hissed one word. "Explain."_

_Another toothless, misshapen smile emerged on Grindelwald's face. "The Elder Wand has a bloody past, but that is not just because of the allure it holds for certain wizards. No, that wand's history is draped in blood because of its need for it...blood is its legacy...blood is its key..._ _only with murder can that wand bestow complete and utter allegiance._

_"No doubt that is why Dumbledore sought to take the wand with him to the grave. Yet there is magic, dark and powerful magic, that can restore the Elder Wand to its original prowess. It is magic that, I am sure, Dumbledore never knew of."_

_"But you know of it," Harry whispered, the excitement building up in him as he approached the shriveled figure. "You know the secret to ensure the ultimate use for this wand."_

_"I do," Grindelwald agreed, and sat up despite the obvious effort it caused him, his excitement just as keen as Voldemort's. "You must kill the last remaining owner's of the Elder Wand - all those who have killed to obtain it, and all who have disarmed those same owner's in turn. You must kill all who have had any affiliation with mastering the wand; only then will you be its rightful wielder." _

_"If that is true," said Harry, now beginning to circle Grindelwald like a bird of prey, "then there is only two people, two murders, that stand in my way - and one of them, Grindelwald, is you."_

_"You're wrong," said the withered form, and Harry turned, intending to strike, raising his wand to administer the fatal blow, but the other whispered quickly, "I am not the only one who stands in your way."_

_Harry paused, considering the old man with a shrewd eye. The crouched wizard stared back without blinking, a small sneer playing across his cracked lips. Checking his temper for the sake of information, Harry lowered his wand and fixed his unblinking gaze upon Grindelwald._

_"Continue," he said quietly._

_"There are others, besides Gregorovitch, or Severus Snape and I -" At this, Harry gave a start of surprise, but Grindelwald continued unheeded. "- that at one time possessed the Elder Wand, or disarmed one of the owners. I know my time is drawing near, and indeed, I will not stand in the way of what you so adamantly desire. But if you help me to gain the one last thing _I_ desire, my last request if you will, then I will help you to track down the remaining wizards in your path._

_"Give me what I want."_

_Harry stood silently, pondering over the words and the facts as his fingers stroked the Elder Wand in an almost loving fashion. Anger, intrigue, and suspicion surged through his veins and pounded in his temples for the final act, the strike, the kill. Yet the wizened old face stared up at him, the eyes jewel bright with blood lust and mirrors to the answers stored within - the answers he would need if he were to accomplish his task. What harm would it do, to give a dying man a single request in exchange for the greatest power in the wizarding world? The information he had been looking for lay at his feet, offering him the gateway through which Death could not follow..._

_Harry felt a twisted smile rise to his lips. "And what is it that you want, Grindelwald?"_

_At this, a horrid and deformed grin spread across the ancient face, the mouth opening like some foul cave of mangled gums and jagged teeth, and a fractured, crazed laugh issued forth, ringing throughout the small tower room and drifting down into the prison he had created for his enemies, reverberating off the walls and filling Harry's head with the sound of it..._

"Harry!"

He opened his eyes, taking in a great gulp of air as he did so. He was lying on his back, looking up at the blue sky and Ron's worried face. He was kneeling beside Harry, his face pale with concern and fright. Harry could feel the warmth of the day flooding over him again, the humble sounds of the countryside surrounding him and the vivid colors welcoming and beautiful. Yet he could still faintly hear the sound of Grindelwald's laughter in his ears.

"Are you alright?" Ron asked shakily, helping Harry to sit up. He rubbed his scar, which was throbbing weakly, and felt the sweat on his brow even as he shook involuntarily. "What did you see? Here -"

He stood up and held out a hand, which Harry gratefully accepted. His head ached as though someone had tried to force his brain out through his scar, while the scar itself now prickled feverishly in the aftermath of the vision. He kept expecting to see the fortress of Nurmengard in the distance, out across the sea, or the demented eyes of Grindelwald in the shade beneath the porch awning. He took a deep breath to steady his nerves, and then turned to Ron, who was still watching him anxiously as though afraid he might collapse again.

"Something bad has happened," Harry said, and ignored the brief pain that shot over his scar, and the feelings of exhilaration in his gut that he knew belonged to Voldemort. "I think there's more to the Hallows - to the Elder Wand - than we thought, and if I'm right, You-Know-Who is about to go on a killing spree."

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A/N: Perhaps a little confusing, but all will be clarified in time. Please, _please _review and tell me if this is worth a second chapter. 


	2. The Rish of Eavesdropping

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter

A/N: Hey! Thanks for the reviews on my first chapter. Not much to say, except enjoy this second installment and tell me what you think of it. Now read!

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Chapter 2: The Risk of Eavesdropping

The hall was dimly lit by a few low burning candles, their light refracting off the ornate picture frames and the polished wood floors. It was deathly still inside the manor, for it was unusually empty tonight. No furtive meetings were taking place, and no prisoners were being held below, moaning and screaming in despair and hopelessness. The parlor doors were shut but for a mere inch between them, where a frail shaft of light came from the dying fire within the room. Draco knew that it would be strangely bare and bland inside, without the great chandelier hanging as its centerpiece.

For a moment he recalled, with shocking clarity, the night when Greyback had brought the prisoners to the manor. He had recognized that Mudblood, and her blood traitor friend Weasley, the instant they had walked through the door. And despite the malformed state he was in, there was no question that the boy in front was Potter. The scar was unmistakable, hexed as it was.

But he had been unable to pass the final judgment. Even watching the bushy haired Granger being tortured had been less disturbing than the prospect of letting slip their real identities, for in the end he was not the direct cause of death. Murder was inevitable, but he could not bring himself to call the Dark Lord forth and say "Here is the one you want to kill." If it was to happen at that second, in his own home where he had once foolishly believed he could find refuge, then it would be because of someone else.

He would not become another Bellatrix or Greyback willingly if he could help it

He made he was as quietly as possible towards the stairs with his stolen food from the kitchen, just in case his father was still awake. Since the night of Potter's escape, his father had slipped into a vengeful depression, in which his own insecurities were being lashed out upon any unfortunate enough to cross his path. There had been too much punishment over the past few days, as Draco remembered with a shudder, and he wanted to avoid any more of it at all costs.

_If that meddling little house elf were still around, I could have just sent him to get the food and not had to risk it. Dropping the chandelier like that...I think I still have a few shards of glass in my face..._

Yet as he placed his foot on the first step, the sound of murmuring voices reached his ears. One had risen to a slight pitch in what he took to be a heated, entirely whispered argument, and they were both coming from the parlor. He stood indecisive for a moment, debating between information for a delay in his midnight snack, but curiosity eventually won out.

He crept back to the parlor, deciding to take a quick glance inside through the minute part between its doors. He saw two silhouettes standing against the backdrop of the fire, one much taller in stature than the other. Both were leaning forward slightly, as though wanting nothing more than to lunge at the person in front of them. With that one visual, Draco ducked back into the shadows to listen.

"It is no concern of yours what the Dark Lord is doing, nor is it in your best interests to question him," one of the voices hissed, and Draco recognized it instantly as Wormtail's. He sounded no less cringing or pitiful from this side of the door, but his tone was somehow more petrified than his normal, subservient one. "What the Dark Lord pursues in his own time is just that, _his_, and you would do well to remember that!"

"So you do not deny that he is pursuing _something_?" the second voice questioned, and it took Draco longer to put a face to it than the first. After a minute of racking his brain, he saw a dark and crowded room with two men entering at the forefront. It was Yaxley's voice, he recounted, but what was he doing here? He did not reside at the manor house as Wormtail did; he shouldn't even be here.

"How am I to know?" Wormtail asked angrily. "It is not as though he lingers in any one place for too long, and I am not foolish enough to ask him about his affairs."

"But he has been staying here at Malfoy Manor until just recently," Yaxley persisted, and there was an odd note of anxiousness in his tone. "He has been leaving for longer periods of time, and just yesterday Lucius informed me that the Dark Lord has not been present for two weeks! There have been more and more scattered sightings, each farther away than the last-"

"What is your point?" Wormtail interrupted.

"Why? _Why?_ Don't you ever consider anything Wormtail, you small minded rat? He's looking for something, and he's agitated at almost all intervals. Perhaps he's trying to find a way to end Potter for good, and the results aren't pleasing? Or perhaps he's seeking to expand his control? Either way, we who are left behind have been suffering of late, haven't we?"

There was a long, thoughtful pause. "Go on," whispered Wormtail.

"I have a feeling that something quite devastating has ensued, or is about to," Yaxley continued, and there was no denying the unease in his voice this time. "I am convinced that the Dark Lord is coveting something powerful, and that in exchange some of his loyal followers will be the payment in turn. He has even shown distinct misgivings in Severus, whom he was pleased with for the correct date on Potter's departure from the Muggle house, despite the fact that the plan failed."

"Snape!" Wormtail hissed loudly, and Yaxley snapped at him to be quiet. Draco leaned in closer to the door as Wormtail continued in a barely audible voice, "Who gives a damn about that slimy git! His fate means nothing-"

"Doesn't it?" Yaxley pressed, and there was something sinister about the way he said it that made Wormtail fall short. After a nasty silence, Yaxley proceeded, "He punished you and the others most severely for Potter's escape, even dear Bellatrix, who is one of his most decorated of Death Eaters. And now he is angered by Snape, the one who took care of that bumbling old fool Dumbledore! Something has driven him to obsession, and that obsession has transcended his faithful..."

"But what does that mean? How can you be sure that...that we could be...?" Wormtail stammered fearfully, unable to complete the thought.

"Has anything strange happened lately? Anything that would arouse suspicion?" Yaxley asked in the silence that followed.

"Perhaps...yes, yes there has!" Wormtail replied, his voice rising again in panic and uncertainty. After Yaxley hissed another warning, he continued softly, "The night Potter was here! One of those Snatchers that was with Greyback had a sword with him, and Bellatrix went into a rage - she seemed to think that Potter and his friends had been in their vault - and she said the we would all be dead if we called the Dark Lord at that point."

"Why? Did she mention anything else that was in the vault?"

"No, but it seemed that there _were_ things that she was directly concerned about...things that the Dark Lord had entrusted to her specifically..."

Draco didn't seem to realize that he was holding his breath, his heart thumping wildly in his ribcage as he waited for them to continue. His thoughts were spinning around in his head, mixed with fragments of recent memories and pictures devised by his own imagination. Yaxley's theories seemed far fetched at best, mere paranoia of a scared and insecure follower, but the things he was pointing out, the links and patterns...they were somehow tying in together.

"Do you think...?" Wormtail began to ask. His voice trailed away, as though he were reluctant to finish the question, but when he spoke again, Draco was angered to hear, not fear in that voice, but pure optimism. "Do you think the Dark Lord means to punish Severus, or perhaps even...to _kill _him?"

"It is a distinct possibility," Yaxley replied, but he sounded only vaguely interested in their discussion now. Apparently, he had been rather shaken at Wormtail's information, and was trying to piece it together with everything he himself already knew. "What happened with the sword?"

"Well, eventually we brought up a goblin that had been caught by the Snatchers to verify if the sword was indeed goblin made, and therefore to see if the one Potter was carrying had been a fake. It was, and so it seems that the real one is secured safely in the Lestrange's vault."

"And then?"

"You know what happened then, you forgetful prat!" Wormtail countered angrily. "I went to get Potter and the others, and they jumped me! Knocked me out, and when I came to, I was punished...most strictly...for letting them escape." He trailed away, his voice weak and fatigued by fright.

"Where's the sword now?" Yaxley asked, ignoring the other's discomfort at unpleasant memories.

"They took it with them," Wormtail grumbled, no doubt wanting an end to this interview.

"Interesting," Yaxley whispered, and at Wormtail's insistence, added, "Think, Wormtail, think! It's quite a feat for you, but try it at the very least. Why would the Potter brat take with him a sword that was useless? If it was fake, then why would they risk their lives to take it with them? Perhaps it wasn't the sword that was fake...perhaps it was what was said about it that was less than truthful..."

A pensive silence followed Yaxley's words, and Wormtail was probably grasping at their meaning in the parlor as much as Draco was out in the hallway. Did he mean that Potter had stolen the actual sword? The one which was supposed to be in the vault? Had the goblin lied? And what else was being kept safe in that vault, so valuable to the Dark Lord that Bellatrix feared death as the ultimate penalty for losing it?

There seemed to be more left unsaid between the two Death Eaters, but just as Wormtail made a noise as if to speak, there came the groan of floorboards overhead. Muffled footsteps could be heard moving about, and Draco knew he had lingered in the shadows much too long. He heard more footsteps, these alarmingly close at hand from just within the parlor, and he instantly scrambled for the stairs.

He reached the first landing just as Yaxley came into the hall, and hid quickly in the darkness of the doorway at the top of the stairs. He watched as Yaxley gave a curt nod to Wormtail, who only glowered at the man in return, and then headed out the front door to Apparate on the lawn. As soon as the door snapped shut, Wormtail walked past the bottom of the stairs toward the back of the house, where his room was situated, cursing softly under his breath. Then the scene settled, and it grew eerily quiet once more.

With the impression that he was lugging a heavy weight about his neck, Draco lumbered back up the stairs to his bedroom. His mind was buzzing, but he felt oddly blank inside, as though the slat of his emotions had been wiped clean. He entered his room and shut the door as quietly as possible on its rusty hinges, throwing the food he had brought with him listlessly to the side; his appetite had deserted him.

He threw off his dressing gown and got into bed, lying back on the covers without the merest trace of drowsiness. He stared up at the ceiling, not really seeing it at all, but pretending it was a canvas on which he could play out what was in his head. He saw himself and Potter grappling on the floor of the parlor until his own wand was pulled from his grasp, the outlines of Yaxley and Wormtail whispering by the fire, the sword with its ruby encrusted hilt, the chandelier falling and Bellatrix diving out from under it...

And he saw the face of Severus Snape, calm and collective as always, yet suddenly thrown into sharp relief by a blinding flash of green light.

Draco closed his eyes and rolled over, adjusting his pillows irritably in order to distract himself. So what if Snape was not in the Dark Lord's good graces? That did not mean _immediate _death, as Yaxley believed, especially for one who had gained much favor in the Dark Lord's eyes. And so what if that was his eventual fate? The favor Snape _had _obtained should have been his anyway! It had been _his _task, _his _mission, to kill Dumbledore, and had those annoying Carrows and that disgusting werewolf kept their distance, he would have had ample time to ready himself and finish the job-

Yet even as he thought this, he knew it to be a childish lie. He could never have killed Dumbledore, with him lying so pathetically cornered and shriveled up as Draco had found him. To kill was a hard enough concept to conceive of, but to murder in cold blood a wizard unarmed and weakened, like Greyback and his revolting habit of preying on children, was not a possibility for him. Anyone could kill when graced with the upper hand; only a duel could justify the Killing Curse.

But the problem of Snape still remained. Did he know of his own standing with the Dark Lord? Did he know that he was possibly in danger?

_Even if he is, what can I do about? _Draco questioned himself angrily. _Even if I were to warn him when I return to Hogwarts tomorrow, what good would it do? Where could he run to where the Dark Lord could not follow? He's found out most of the Mudbloods, got dementors swarming the streets of Hogsmeade and so many other places...death is a prospect every one of us faces at the Dark Lord's hands, all of his Death Eaters are susceptible, and Severus Snape is no different, nothing special..._

Yet all the while his thoughts drifted to Potter and what he had overheard, as he considered the reasons behind the sword and the other important objects stowed away in Bellatrix's vault, the tight knot of foreboding did not loosen in his chest. He fell into an agitated sleep filled with nightmares of shrouded figures and flares of green light, and the image of Snape spread eagle on the grounds of Hogwarts, his sightless eyes staring up into a moonless midnight sky.

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A/N: What's in store for Snape? And for Draco? What does this have to do with Harry Potter? All in good time, dear reader. Please review! 


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